Great Ormond Street Hospital

Great Ormond Street Hospital for Children NHS Trust has implemented their printed wristband solution to comply with the National Patient Safety Agency (NPSA) Positive Patient Identification directive in the UK. After exhaustive trials and evaluation, the hospital finally chose the Zebra® HC100™ wristband printer with its unique cartridge loading features along with 3rd party 2D barcode imagers with special healthcare plastics.

The Story

The Challenge

Great Ormond Street Hospital for Children NHS Trust has implemented their printed wristband solution to comply with the National Patient Safety Agency (NPSA) Positive Patient Identification directive in the UK. After exhaustive trials and evaluation, the hospital finally chose the Zebra® HC100™ wristband printer with its unique cartridge loading features along with 3rd party 2D barcode imagers with special healthcare plastics.

The Solution

Extensive and rigorous selection process. Great Ormond Street Hospital left no stone unturned in selecting the requisite solution having evaluated numerous different technologies with various technology solution providers over several months. The trust attended a new technology day in 2009 organised by its chosen technology solutions provider. This organisation was also invited to attend numerous on-site meetings which included presentations to clinicians, loaning of demonstration equipment and a live pilot on two wards.

Linear and 2D barcode solution. A training package organised for the trust by their solutions provider incorporating technical and clinical areas ensured that a relatively trouble-free implementation was carried out on-site over a number of days. Great Ormond Street Hospital also incorporated a fully compliant GS1 2D barcode on all the wristbands used across the trust. They also needed to use a standard linear barcode due to the use of specialist analysers by the trust. The complexity of this project was increased as the trust admits both NHS (National Health Service) as well as private patients. The requirement to incorporate both linear and 2D barcodes on a very small area on the wristbands required thorough testing of the new Zebra soft infant Z-Band wristbands.

The trust undertook a comprehensive evaluation process as we do with all projects and it was quickly evident that our chosen technology solutions provider understood the challenges we faced as an organisation.

Meredith Mora, CRS Project Manager, Great Ormond Street Hospital,

Results

A credible, NPSA compliant, flexible solution. Meredith Mora, CRS Project Manager at Great Ormond Street Hospital, commented "The trust undertook a comprehensive evaluation process as we do with all projects and it was quickly evident that our chosen technology solutions provider understood the challenges we faced as an organisation. They impressed us with their knowledge, integration expertise and flexible approach proposing a credible printing solution which meant Great Ormond Street rolled out a system that was NPSA compliant, yet easy for staff to operate."